Computerized methods and computer systems for matching customers with merchants

ABSTRACT

For each of multiple customers, a computer system constructs a customer preference model using transactional level data relating to purchases the customers have made using respective payment cards. The computer system has access to a database with merchant data, including profiles of merchants. Upon the customer contacting the computer system in respect of a specific product, the computer system (or an application running on a communication device of the customer which is able to access the customer&#39;s preference model and the database of merchant data) uses the customer preference model to match the customer to merchants who offer the product and who have profile matching the customer&#39;s preference model. The customer may provide details of his/her payment card identify the customer to the computer system.

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates to methods and systems for matchingpotential customers to merchants.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

Individuals (here referred to as “customers”) who want to purchasecertain goods and/or services (referred to in this document collectivelyas “products”) face a bewildering range of options. This is particularlythe case for a customer who is travelling to an unfamiliar destination,or who has recently changed address to a new locality, and who has toselect providers of products (here referred to as “merchants”) in thatlocality or destination. Nowadays, such a customer can search onlineusing a search engine for places to stay (hotel bookings), places tovisit (attractions), dining options (e.g. restaurants), and car rentaloptions, but picking appropriate merchants from the potentiallythousands on offer soon becomes a tedious task. Some customers rely ononline reviews left by previous purchasers of the products, but for someproviders reviews are not available, are not reliable, or reflect theviews of individuals very different from the customer doing the search.

A particular problem is that often many merchants are inappropriate forthe customer's preferences (e.g. their prices are outside a range ofprices which the customer is prepared to pay) even if they are suitablefor other customers. It can take the customer considerable time todiscover this. This is particularly true if a given merchant does notpublish its tariff online, and/or if the merchant has a complex systemof special offers which mean that the actual price the customer would becharged is different from what the standard tariff would suggest.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

The present invention aims to provide customers with recommendations ofmerchants, and/or of product offers offered by the merchants.

In general terms, the invention proposes that for each of multiplecustomers, a computer system constructs a customer preference modelusing transactional level data relating to purchases the customers havemade using respective payment cards. The computer system has access to adatabase with merchant data, including profiles of merchants.

Upon the customer specifying a product the customer wishes to buy, thecomputer system (or an application running on a communication device ofthe customer which is able to access the customer's preference model andthe database of merchant data) uses the customer preference model tomatch the customer to merchants who offer the product and who haveprofiles matching the customer's preference model. The customer mayprovide data identifying his/her payment card to identify the customerto the computer system.

The customer preference model may comprise any one or more (preferablyall) of the following customer properties: historical transactioncharacteristics (i.e. spending patterns taking into account the value ofthe customer's previous transactions), price sensitivity, and brandloyalty.

Optionally, the system may characterize customers as either a customerfor whom price sensitivity is most important, or as a customer for whombrand loyalty is most important.

The customer preference model may, for one or more of the customerproperties, assign a customer to one of a predetermined set of tiers.

Some of these characteristics may be hard to deduce using the simplestforms of transactional data available (which simply indicate therecipient of the payment, the size of the payment and the time/date ofthe payment). However, for certain transactions transactional datafurther comprises “addendum data”. For example, it is alreadyincreasingly common for transactions involving airline ticket purchasesto include addendum data including all relevant passenger and flightinformation. Similar addendum data is also commonly included intransaction data for car rentals, as well as for certain restaurantpayments, lodging (hotel) payments and railway payments. It is used forexample for verifying expenses claims. The addendum data may includestock keeping unit (SKU) data, which specifies the actual product(s)purchased in the transaction. The addendum data may be used by anembodiment of the present data to obtain information about certainproperties of the customer preference model.

Furthermore, the provider of the computer system may be able to obtainfurther information from the merchants relating to the transactions. Forexample, if the provider of the computer system wishes to compile acustomer preference model relating to a certain customer, then,following a transaction involving the customer and a certain merchant,the merchant may supply the computer system with further informationabout the transaction (e.g. what products were purchased at what price).The merchants themselves may decide when to do this (e.g. because apayment card meeting one or more criteria was used in the transaction,such as a card issued by a certain issuer bank and/or provided by acertain payment network), or may submit a query to the payment networkabout whether the further information should be transmitted to thecomputer system and only supply the information if the result of thequery is positive. Alternatively, the computer system may issue a queryabout the transaction to the merchant, which provides the furtherinformation in response.

By participating in an embodiment of the present invention a merchant ispotentially able to expand its revenue by being recommended to customerswho suit the merchant both in terms of the merchant's products beingsuitable, and the prices too being suitable. Profitability is improvedby focusing on relevant customers. The embodiment provides in effecttargeted marketing: identifying the right customers to provide offers toat the right time. These may be customers who are already customers ofthe merchant, but the invention makes it possible to increase the “shareof the wallet” for those customers.

As used in this document, the term “payment card” refers to any cashlesspayment device associated with a payment account, such as a credit card,a debit card, a prepaid card, a charge card, a membership card, apromotional card, a frequent flyer card, an identification card, a giftcard, and/or any other device that may hold payment account information,such as mobile phones, Smartphones, personal digital assistants (PDAs),key fobs, transponder devices, NFC-enabled devices, and/or computers.

The invention may be expressed in terms of a computer system which formsand uses the customer preference model, in terms of a communicationdevice associated with a customer, or in terms of the method performedby the computer system or communication device. It may furthermore beexpressed in terms of a computer program product (e.g. stored innon-transitory form on a tangible data storage device) which containsprogram instructions to cause a processor of the communication device toperform the method.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE FIGURES

An embodiment of the invention will now be described for the sake ofexample only with reference to the following figures in which:

FIG. 1 shows a computerized network including a computer system which isan embodiment of the invention;

FIG. 2 is a flow diagram of a customer analysis process carried out bythe computer system of FIG. 1 in a first mode of operation;

FIG. 3 shows a second mode of operation of the computer system of FIG.1;

FIG. 4 is a flow diagram of a method according to the inventionperformed by the computer system of FIG. 1 in the second mode ofoperation;

FIG. 5 is a schematic diagram of the structure of the computer system ofFIG. 1;

FIG. 6 is a schematic diagram of a communication device associated witha customer; and

FIG. 7 illustrates an alternative form of a computer system of thecomputerized network of FIG. 1.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE EMBODIMENT

Referring firstly to FIG. 1, a computerized network is shown including acomputer system 1 which is an embodiment of the invention. The computersystem 1 is associated with a payment card network for processingpayments made using payment cards issued by issuer banks. For example,the computer system 1 may be owned by a company which owns the paymentcard network. It includes a payment network server 10 and a set ofdatabases 9, 11, 17. A first mode of operation of the computer system 1will be explained below with reference to FIGS. 1 and 2. A second modeof operation of the computer system 1 will be explained below withreference to FIGS. 3 and 4.

In the first mode of operation, the computer system 1 interacts over acommunication network 3 such as the internet with a plurality of pointof sales (POS) terminals at retail locations, and with a plurality ofmerchant servers implementing online stores. For simplicity, only asingle POS terminal 5 and a single merchant server 7 are shown in FIG.1, and it is assumed below that they are associated with the samemerchant, but the embodiment is not limited in this respect. Themerchant server 7 includes a product database 8 with data about theproducts offered by the online store.

As in conventional payment card processing system, upon a customerinitiating a payment transaction using the POS terminal 5, the POSterminal 5 reads payment card data (such as the primary account number(PAN)) from the payment card sufficient to identify a payment accountassociated with the customer and maintained by an issuer bank 15. ThePOS terminal 5 passes the payment card data together with details of theintended payment transaction to the server 13 of a bank (the “acquirer”bank) where the merchant maintains an account. The acquirer bank server13 identifies that the payment card is linked to the payment networkassociated with the computer system 1, and passes the payment card datato the payment network server 10 of the computer system 1 together withthe details of the intended payment transaction. In some arrangements,acquirer bank server 13 is replaced by a server of a third party(payment processor) authorized by the acquirer, which performs the roleas the acquirer bank server 13 in the steps explained above and in thefollowing steps.

Similarly, upon a customer initiating a payment transaction at theonline store using a communications device (not shown) associated withthe customer, the customer enters the payment card data into thecommunications device which transmits it to the merchant server 7. Themerchant server 7 passes the payment card data together with details ofthe intended payment transaction to a payment gateway, which forwardsthe payment card data and the details of the intended transaction to theacquirer bank server 13. The acquirer bank server 13 identifies that thepayment card is linked to the payment network associated with thecomputer system 1, and passes the payment card data to the paymentnetwork server 10 of the computer system 1 together with the details ofthe intended payment transaction.

In either case, the details of the payment transaction include theamount of the payment and data sufficient to identify a payment accountassociated with the merchant and maintained by an acquirer bank 13. Thedetails of the payment transaction may further include addendum data,which may include SKU level information which specifies details of theactual product(s) purchased in the transaction. In both cases, thepayment network server 10 issues a payment request to an issuer bank 15which maintains a payment account associated with the customer andidentified by the payment card data. The issuer bank 15 performs anauthorization process, and if that is successful, reserves an amount ofmoney from the payment account of the customer, and confirms to thepayment network server 10 that the payment will be made. The paymentnetwork server 10 routes the authorization message to the acquirer bankserver 13 (or the payment processor if the acquirer bank server isreplaced with the payment processor). In the case of a purchase madeusing the POS terminal 5, the acquirer bank server 13 (or paymentprocessor) routes the authorization message to the POS terminal 5; inthe case of an online purchase, the acquirer bank server 13 (or paymentprocessor) routes the authorization message to the payment gateway whichroutes it to the merchant server 7. The payment transaction is thencompleted, although the payment from the issuer bank to the acquirerbank is actually typically made later, during a periodic clearingoperation in respect of a large number of payment transactions.

As in a conventional payment card processing system, the computer system1 keeps a record of the transaction in a database 9, based on the datathe payment network server 10 received from the POS terminal 5 and/ormerchant server 7.

In an embodiment of the present system the POS terminal 5 or merchantserver 7 may include more detailed information about the transactionthan in a conventional payment process. For example, although it isconventional to include addendum data for certain sorts of transactions(e.g. ones relating to lodging, flights or car rental), in the presentsystem the POS terminal 5 or merchant server 7 may supply addendum datafor a wider range of products. Furthermore, the details of the intendedpayment transaction may include information which is not normallypresent in addendum data, such as information about whether the productto be bought is discounted, whether the customer has presented a loyaltycard, etc.

Optionally, the POS terminal 5 or merchant server 7 may recognise thatthe payment card is linked to the payment network associated with thecomputer system 1. It may be as a consequence of this that the POSterminal 5 or merchant server 7 includes the detailed information aboutthe transaction in the data it sends the payment network server 10. Inother words, the POS terminal 5 or merchant server 7 may provide lessinformation about the transaction if the customer's payment card is notlinked to the payment network associated with the computer system 1.

The payment network server 10 may store the detailed information aboutthe transaction in the database 9 for all payment cards, e.g. uponreceiving the transaction data from the POS terminal 5 or merchantserver 7. Alternatively, the computer system 1 may determine whether thecustomer or the payment card is one of a predetermined set of customersor payment cards, and only store the detailed information about thepayment transaction if that determination is positive. These may forexample be customers who have signed up for use of the service describedbelow with reference to FIGS. 3 and 4. In this case, the POS terminal 5or merchant server 7 may determine whether the information received fromthe POS terminal 5 or merchant server 7 is detailed enough to meet acriterion, and if not interrogate the POS terminal 5 or merchant server7 for the detailed information, e.g. including information about theproduct sold in the transaction.

The data stored in the database 9 is analysed in the method 100illustrated in FIG. 2. This is analysis may be performed by the paymentnetwork server 10 as illustrated in the bo

The method may be carried out, for example, in respect of any paymentcard when a certain amount of information has accumulated in thedatabase 9 about payment transactions involving the payment card.Alternatively, this may be done only in respect of any payment card forwhich the corresponding customer has signed up for the service describedbelow with reference to FIGS. 3 and 4. Optionally, if the customer hasmultiple payment cards linked to the payment network, the data inrespect of these cards may be agglomerated to obtain information aboutthe customer, but for simplicity in the following discussion it isassumed that the customer is associated with only one payment cardlinked to the payment network.

In step 101, the payment network server 10 uses the data in the database9 to characterize the past transaction history of the customer. This maybe by extracting one or more parameters such as the total spend of thecustomer using the payment card during a certain period, an averagespend by the customer per transaction, the total number of transactions,etc. As a result of this analysis, the customer is allotted to one of apre-determined number of customer segments. These segments areindicative of the customer's potential to spend.

In step 102, the payment network server 10 forms a model of the pricesensitivity of the customer, including one or more numerical paymentsensitivity measures. For example, if the SKU data indicates that theproduct is an up-market product (e.g. a luxury hotel room), this mayindicate that the price sensitivity of the customer is low. In anotherexample, if the SKU data for a certain transaction indicates that thecustomer has paid a certain amount for a certain product, the paymentnetwork server 10 may compare this with SKU data for other customerswho, according to the SKU data for other payment transactions, bought asimilar product from another merchant at a similar time, to determinewhether the customer paid a low or high price for the article. If itdetermines that the customer paid a relatively high price, this mayindicate that the customer has not shopped around for the cheapestmerchant, which indicates that the customer's price sensitivity is low.If the addendum data indicates that the customer uses a loyalty card,that information may be used to increase the price sensitivity measure.

In another possibility, price sensitive customers may be identified ascustomers who only buy certain products at times when the price of thoseproducts is low (because of discount offers or other time variations inprice, such as seasonal variations). These customers may be identifiedby comparing the times at which they make purchases of certain products(according to the SKU data) with a database of data describing thetime-variation of the prices of those products, to identifystatistically significant correlations. A numerical measure of thecorrelation for a given customer may be compared to a threshold todetermine whether the customer is price sensitive.

A specific example of a price sensitivity model which may be used in anembodiment of the invention is given in “Identifying Price SensitiveConsumers: The Relative Merits of Demographic vs. Purchase PatternInformation”, by B-D. Kim, K. Srinivasan and R. T. Wilcox, Journal ofRetailing, volume 75(2), pp173-193, 1999.

In step 103, the payment network server 10 forms a model (e.g. anumerical measure of the brand loyalty of the customer, e.g. one or morenumerical brand loyalty measures. The model may be indicative of loyaltyto a particular merchant, or loyalty to a particular product. An exampleof determining that the customer is loyal to a certain merchant would bethe payment network server 10 determining that the customer tends to usea small number of merchants in a given retail sector which contains amuch larger number of merchants (e.g. if the computer system determinesthat in 90% of cases the customer does supermarket shopping in a singlesupermarket, this is a good indication that the customer is loyal tothat supermarket). An example of determining that the customer is loyalto a particular product is if the transaction data (e.g. the SKUinformation in addendum data of the transaction data) indicates that thecustomer buys a certain product rather than its competitors. Forexample, the transaction data may show that although the customer hirescars from a large number of car rental companies in differentgeographical locations, he always hires a car of a certain make. Or thatalthough the customer does grocery shopping at various retail outlets,the customer buys a certain brand of toothpaste (or another category ofproduct) with a frequency above a certain threshold, irrespective ofwhat other products may be available. Of course, there may be reasonsother than brand loyalty why a customer always purchases the sameproducts and/or often uses the same merchant (e.g. because the merchanthas a very convenient geographic location), but these factors wouldinfluence the brand loyalty model less if the brand loyalty model takesinto account the customer's payment transactions with respect to a highnumber of products and/or merchants.

Note that the embodiment may use any of multiple definitions of loyalty.A first definition is that in a given commercial sector, the customerpurchases products only from a particular merchant. A second definition(“Customer Stickiness”) is that the customer makes repeat purchases froma certain merchant above a certain level, and that that merchant has avery high “Share of Wallet” (i.e. a high share of the customer's totalpurchases in all commercial sectors). The term “high” may be defined asabove a pre-defined threshold. The threshold may vary according to thecommercial sector of the merchant, to reflect the number of merchantsoperating in the sector, and may vary from one merchant to another. Itmay be set by trial-and-error, or may be determined (e.g. automatically)for a given merchant by calculating the merchant's respective “share ofwallet” for each of a plurality of the merchant's customers, and thenselecting the threshold such that for a certain proportion (e.g. 60% or80%) of those customers the merchant's “share of wallet” is below thethreshold. Thus, a given customer may be identified as being loyal tothe merchant if, for example, the customer's spending with thesemerchant is greater than that of 60% of the merchant's customers. Thesecond definition of loyalty may be preferable, since if a certaincustomer very rarely buys a certain type of product, it may not matterthat when this happens the customer always buys that product from thesame merchant (i.e. is loyal according to the first definition).

In step 104, the server 1 uses the price sensitivity model and the brandloyalty model to categorise the customer according to whether thecustomer's behaviour is better described by price sensitivity or bybrand loyalty (i.e. “tag” the customer as price sensitive or brandloyal). For example, if a customer shows great loyalty to certainproducts and/or merchants, this would suggest that the customer is notprepared to shop around for cheaper products; in other words, that brandloyalty is a better determinant of the customer's behaviour than priceloyalty. Note that even if the server 1 only has information about thecustomer's purchases for certain sorts of products (e.g. hotel lodging,car rental and flights), that can be enough to assess with reasonableaccuracy whether price sensitivity or brand loyalty better characterizesthe customer, and this determination is likely to apply to other typesof products for which such detailed transaction information is notavailable.

In step 105, the customer is allotted to a tier to indicate the extentto which the characteristic with which the customer was tagged in step104 (i.e. price sensitive or brand loyal) describes the user behaviour.For example, there may be three tiers of price sensitivity, such that aprice sensitive customer is allotted, based on the price sensitivitymodel, to one of the tiers “very price sensitive”, “moderately pricesensitive”, or “slightly price sensitive”. Similarly, a customer taggedas being brand loyal, can be allotted, based on the brand loyalty model,to one of three tiers: “very brand loyal”, “moderately brand loyal”, or“slightly brand loyal”. The results of steps 101 to 105 are stored inthe database 11.

Turning to FIG. 3, a second mode of operation of the computer system 1is shown. In this mode the customer uses a communication device 21 tocommunicate with the computer system 1. The communication device 21 hasa screen 21 a (for example, a touch screen) and keys 21 b (which may bevirtual keys displayed on screen 21 a), and communicates with thepayment network server 10 over the communication network 3. Thecommunication device 21 may use a standard browser with communicateswith a website maintained by the payment network server 10. As describedbelow, the payment network server 10 accesses the databases 11 and 17during this process, to perform the method 200 illustrated in FIG. 4.

Alternatively, the communication device 21 may run an application whichis able to communicate with the payment network server 10. In this case,the payment network server 10 may perform the method 200 with theapplication merely relaying information between the customer and thepayment network server 10. Or alternatively a processor of thecommunication device 21 may perform the method 200 using programinstructions contained in the application. During this process theapplication would communicate with the payment network server 10 toaccess the databases 11 and 17.

The method 200 uses a database 17 which was not used in the method 100.This is a database which stores information about merchants, includingwhat products they sell (which may be just an indication of what generalcommercial field they operate in, or what specific products they sell).The merchants for whom information is stored in the database 17 may fromany industry such as: the hotel industry; the restaurant industry; theapparel industry; the hospital industry; the airline industry; thetelecom industry; the jewellery industry; the fuel (e.g.petrol/gasoline) industry, etc.

The database 17 further includes one or more additional characteristicsof each merchant.

At least one of the additional characteristic may be based on averageticket size (i.e. the mean value of payment transactions to themerchants), the average of the amount each of the merchants customersspent at the merchant during a certain period (i.e. the total of all thepayment transactions which all customers made to the merchant during theperiod, divided by the number of those customers), or the frequency withwhich customers make a repeat payment transaction to the merchant. Thesecharacteristics are preferably chosen to match the customercharacteristics derived in step 101. The computer system 1 may derivesuch characteristics of the merchant based on transactional data storedin the database 9, particularly if the criterion is average ticket size,the average of the amount each of the merchant's customers spent at themerchant during a certain period, or the frequency with which customersmake a repeat payment transaction to the merchant.

The information may further include an average price of products offeredby merchants, e.g. in a single product category (e.g. dresses). Theinformation also preferably includes information about the presentprices of specific products the merchant is offering. This informationis preferably up-to-date enough to indicate whether the merchant ispresently offering a temporary discount on products in the category.

In principle, some or all of the information in the database 17 aboutthe additional characteristic(s) may be collected by the computer system1 automatically, using transaction data and the addendum data.Alternatively, the merchant may supply this information to the computersystem 1 to include in the database 17. In particular, merchants whowish to participate in the system may supply (e.g. at intervals)information about product price offers they are making.

The information in the database 17 may categorize the merchants intorespective tiers based on the one or more additional characteristics.

In step 201, a customer indicates to the communication device 21 thatthe customer has an interest in buying a product. In certainembodiments, this may be done explicitly, for example by the customer,at a time when the website or application has been activated, making achoice from a drop-down menu or entering search terms into a search box.Alternatively, the customer may carry out some behaviour which triggersthe communication device 21 (or server 1) to infer that the customer maywish to wish to purchase a product. For example, if the customer buys acertain piece of equipment from an online store, the communicationdevice 21 may infer that the customer is interested in accessories forthat piece of equipment.

In optional step 202, the customer indicates a location to thecommunication device 21. This is a geographical location, e.g. a town,or within a certain distance of a certain exact position (e.g. theuser's present location), or in a certain shopping mall. Again, this maybe done explicitly, for example by the customer, at a time when thewebsite or application has been activated, making a choice from adrop-down menu or entering search terms into a search box, or making acommand to indicate that the customer's present location, or one of aplurality of previously stored locations, should be taken as thelocation. Or, the customer may indicate the location choice implicitly,for example by purchasing a travel ticket to a certain location. Notethat if step 2 is omitted (e.g. because the customer enters into thecommunication device 21 a command to omit it), then subsequent steps ofthe method are performed without reference to geographical location.This is appropriate, for example, when the method 200 is being performedto identify merchants who sell mail-order goods.

In step 203, the communication device 21 transmits to the paymentnetwork server 10 data identifying the payment account. In principle,this can be the 16-digit PAN (primary account number) of the paymentcard. However, in other embodiments it may be a token which the paymentnetwork server 10 can use to access a database to identify the paymentaccount. The token may have been generated earlier. For example it mayhave been generated by the payment network server 10 at a time when thecustomer registered to participate in the merchant recommendationservice, or by the issuing bank 15.

In step 204, the payment network server 10 accesses the database 11using the payment account identification data, to obtain thecorresponding customer preference model.

In step 205, the payment network server 10 identifies one (or more) ofthe merchants who supplies the product specified in step 201. Ifoptional step 202 was carried out, step 205 may be limited to findingmerchants in the location specified in step 202. Step 205 furtherincludes calculates a compatibility index between the customer and suchmerchants, using the customer preference model and the data about themerchants in the database 17. The highest one or more merchants in thisranking are identified (“matched” with the customer). If no merchantshave a compatibility index above a threshold, then no merchants arematched with the customer.

One way of determining the compatibility index is by comparing thecustomer segmentation according to the customer preference model, withthe merchant. For example, a customer who is identified as consistentlymaking small purchases, will have a low compatibility index with amerchant for which the database 17 indicates a high average ticketvalue.

For a customer who is tagged as price sensitive, step 205 may result inthe customer being matched with a merchant which operates in a discountsector of the marketplace (e.g. a merchant for whom the average pricesof products in a certain product category, such as the categoryspecified in step 201, are low), or a merchant who is currently offeringdiscounted prices in relation to the products indicated in step 201.

Particularly in the case of a customer who is tagged as brand loyal, thecompatibility index may be calculated using also data in the database 9.For example, a higher compatibility index will be obtained for amerchant from whom the customer has made a purchase before (e.g. in adifferent retail location), or a merchant who offers a product thecustomer has previously bought (e.g. a customer who tends to buy acertain form of mineral water will be more likely to be matched to agrocery outlet which sells that brand).

As noted above, the customer preference model may categorize thecustomer into tiers based on historical transaction characteristics(i.e. spending patterns taking into account the value of the customer'sprevious transactions), and also into tiers based on either pricesensitivity or brand loyalty. Merchants too may be categorized intotiers, and the calculation of the compatibility index may be dependenton the tiers into which the merchants and customers have beencategorized.

Step 205 may include using known algorithms to calculate a “propensityto buy” for each of the merchants offering the product specified in step201 at the location specified in step 202. Furthermore, step 205 mayinclude predicting the next product the customer is likely to buy andmatching the customer with merchants which offer that product. Forexample, a customer who has just purchased skis and ski-boots, and whohas in step 201 specified “clothing”, may be more likely in step 205 tobe matched with a merchant who sells clothing for skiers (i.e. thecompatibility index for that merchant will be higher).

As noted above, step 205 may only recommend merchants in the locationspecified in step 202. If step 202 was not performed then in step 205the server 1 may use the customer's present location (e.g. as obtainedby a GPS device of the communication device 21) or limit the search ofmerchants to those which supply products to any location, for example bymail.

In step 206, the details of the one or more matched merchants (if any),and optionally details of one or more offers the matched merchants aremaking to provide the product specified in step 201, are displayed tothe customer. If the method 200 is being performed by the paymentnetwork computer 10, these details are supplied to the communicationdevice 21. Alternatively, if the method 200 is being performed by thecommunication device 21, the communication device 21 may request thisinformation from the payment server 10, which obtains them from thedatabase 17 and supplies them to the communication device 21. In eithercase, the communication device 21 may display them to the customer, forexample on screen 21 a. This may include providing location details ofoutlets of the matched merchants near the location specified in step202.

The customer may use the supplied information to make contact with themerchant, e.g. by going to the specified outlet. In this way thecustomer may obtain more information about the merchant and/or product,or instigate a purchase of the product.

FIG. 5 is a block diagram showing a technical architecture of thecomputer system 1.

The technical architecture includes a processor 222 (which may bereferred to as a central processor unit or CPU) that is in communicationwith memory devices including secondary storage 224 (such as diskdrives), read only memory (ROM) 226, random access memory (RAM) 228. Theprocessor 222 may be implemented as one or more CPU chips. The technicalarchitecture may further comprise input/output (I/O) devices 230, andnetwork connectivity devices 232.

The secondary storage 224 may provide the memory space to support thedatabases 9, 11, 17. The secondary storage 224 is typically comprised ofone or more disk drives or tape drives and is used for non-volatilestorage of data and as an over-flow data storage device if RAM 228 isnot large enough to hold all working data. Secondary storage 224 may beused to store programs which are loaded into RAM 228 when such programsare selected for execution.

In this embodiment, the secondary storage 224 has an order processingcomponent 224 a comprising non-transitory instructions operative by theprocessor 222 to perform various operations of the method of the presentdisclosure. The ROM 226 is used to store instructions and perhaps datawhich are read during program execution. The secondary storage 224, theRAM 228, and/or the ROM 226 may be referred to in some contexts ascomputer readable storage media and/or non-transitory computer readablemedia.

I/O devices 230 may include printers, video monitors, liquid crystaldisplays (LCDs), plasma displays, touch screen displays, keyboards,keypads, switches, dials, mice, track balls, voice recognizers, cardreaders, paper tape readers, or other well-known input devices.

The network connectivity devices 232 may take the form of modems, modembanks, Ethernet cards, universal serial bus (USB) interface cards,serial interfaces, token ring cards, fiber distributed data interface(FDDI) cards, wireless local area network (WLAN) cards, radiotransceiver cards that promote radio communications using protocols suchas code division multiple access (CDMA), global system for mobilecommunications (GSM), long-term evolution (LTE), worldwideinteroperability for microwave access (WiMAX), near field communications(NFC), radio frequency identity (RFID), and/or other air interfaceprotocol radio transceiver cards, and other well-known network devices.These network connectivity devices 232 may enable the processor 222 tocommunicate with the Internet or one or more intranets. With such anetwork connection, it is contemplated that the processor 222 mightreceive information from the network, or might output information to thenetwork in the course of performing the above-described methodoperations. Such information, which is often represented as a sequenceof instructions to be executed using processor 222, may be received fromand outputted to the network, for example, in the form of a computerdata signal embodied in a carrier wave.

The processor 222 executes instructions, codes, computer programs,scripts which it accesses from hard disk, floppy disk, optical disk(these various disk based systems may all be considered secondarystorage 224), flash drive, ROM 226, RAM 228, or the network connectivitydevices 232. While only one processor 222 is shown, multiple processorsmay be present. Thus, while instructions may be discussed as executed bya processor, the instructions may be executed simultaneously, serially,or otherwise executed by one or multiple processors.

Although the technical architecture is described with reference to acomputer, it should be appreciated that the technical architecture maybe formed by two or more computers in communication with each other thatcollaborate to perform a task. For example, but not by way oflimitation, the tasks of methods 100 and 200 may be partitioned in sucha way as to permit concurrent and/or parallel processing of theinstructions of the application. Alternatively, the data processed bythe application may be partitioned in such a way as to permit concurrentand/or parallel processing of different portions of a data set by thetwo or more computers. In an embodiment, virtualization software may beemployed by the technical architecture 220 to provide the functionalityof a number of servers that is not directly bound to the number ofcomputers in the technical architecture 220. In an embodiment, thefunctionality disclosed above may be provided by executing theapplication and/or applications in a cloud computing environment. Cloudcomputing may comprise providing computing services via a networkconnection using dynamically scalable computing resources. A cloudcomputing environment may be established by an enterprise and/or may behired on an as-needed basis from a third party provider.

It is understood that by programming and/or loading executableinstructions onto the technical architecture, at least one of the CPU222, the RAM 228, and the ROM 226 are changed, transforming thetechnical architecture in part into a specific purpose machine orapparatus having the novel functionality taught by the presentdisclosure. It is fundamental to the electrical engineering and softwareengineering arts that functionality that can be implemented by loadingexecutable software into a computer can be converted to a hardwareimplementation by well-known design rules.

FIG. 6 is a block diagram showing a technical architecture of thecommunication device 21. It is envisaged that in embodiments, thecommunication devices 21 may be a smartphone or tablet, or a personalcomputer such as a desktop computer or a laptop computer.

The technical architecture includes a processor 322 (which may bereferred to as a central processor unit or CPU) that is in communicationwith memory devices including secondary storage 324 (such as disk drivesor memory cards), read only memory (ROM) 326, random access memory (RAM)328. The processor 322 may be implemented as one or more CPU chips. Thetechnical architecture further comprises input/output (I/O) devices 330,and network connectivity devices 332.

The I/O devices comprise a user interface (UI) 330 a, a camera 330 b anda geolocation module 330 c. The UI 330 a may comprise a touch screen,keyboard, keypad or other known input device. The camera 330 b allows auser to capture images and save the captured images in electronic form.The geolocation module 330 c is operable to determine the geolocation ofthe communication device using signals from, for example globalpositioning system (GPS) satellites.

The secondary storage 324 is typically comprised of a memory card orother storage device and is used for non-volatile storage of data and asan over-flow data storage device if RAM 328 is not large enough to holdall working data. Secondary storage 324 may be used to store programswhich are loaded into RAM 328 when such programs are selected forexecution.

In this embodiment, the secondary storage 324 has an order generationcomponent 324 a, comprising non-transitory instructions operative by theprocessor 322 to perform various operations of the method of the presentdisclosure. The ROM 326 is used to store instructions and perhaps datawhich are read during program execution. The secondary storage 324, theRAM 328, and/or the ROM 326 may be referred to in some contexts ascomputer readable storage media and/or non-transitory computer readablemedia.

The network connectivity devices 332 may take the form of modems, modembanks, Ethernet cards, universal serial bus (USB) interface cards,serial interfaces, token ring cards, fiber distributed data interface(FDDI) cards, wireless local area network (WLAN) cards, radiotransceiver cards that promote radio communications using protocols suchas code division multiple access (CDMA), global system for mobilecommunications (GSM), long-term evolution (LTE), worldwideinteroperability for microwave access (WiMAX), near field communications(NFC), radio frequency identity (RFID), and/or other air interfaceprotocol radio transceiver cards, and other well-known network devices.These network connectivity devices 332 may enable the processor 322 tocommunicate with the Internet or one or more intranets. With such anetwork connection, it is contemplated that the processor 322 mightreceive information from the network, or might output information to thenetwork in the course of performing the above-described methodoperations. Such information, which is often represented as a sequenceof instructions to be executed using processor 322, may be received fromand outputted to the network, for example, in the form of a computerdata signal embodied in a carrier wave.

The processor 322 executes instructions, codes, computer programs,scripts which it accesses from hard disk, floppy disk, optical disk(these various disk based systems may all be considered secondarystorage 324), flash drive, ROM 326, RAM 328, or the network connectivitydevices 332. While only one processor 322 is shown, multiple processorsmay be present. Thus, while instructions may be discussed as executed bya processor, the instructions may be executed simultaneously, serially,or otherwise executed by one or multiple processors.

In a variant of the embodiment, the computer system 1 may be replaced bya computer system 31 as illustrated in FIG. 7. The databases 9, 11 and17 have the same significance as in FIG. 1, but in this case thecomputer system 31 includes a payment network server 32 which may be ofa conventional design. The payment network server 32 processes a paymenttransaction in the conventional manner described above, by communicatingwith the acquiring bank server 13 and the issuing bank server 15. Thepayment network server 32 accumulates the data in the database 9 by theprocess described above.

The computer system 31 further includes an analysis server 33 (separatefrom the payment network server 32) which is responsible for performingthe methods described above with reference to FIGS. 2 and 4. Theanalysis server 11 is able to access the data stored in the database 9to perform the method of FIG. 2, and thereby generate the data in thedatabase 11 by the process described above with reference to FIG. 2.This may include communicating with the POS terminal 5 and/or merchantserver 7 using the communication network 3, to interrogate the POSterminal 5 and/or the merchant server 7 for information abouttransactions as described above.

The analysis server 33 is also able to communicate with thecommunication device 21 over the communication network 3, and performsteps 204 and 205 of the method of FIG. 4 as described above, using thedata in the databases 11 and 17. The structure of the payment networkserver 32 and the analysis server 33 may be as illustrated in FIG. 5.

Thus, the computer system 31 is operative to perform all the functionsof the computer system 1, but without the methods of FIGS. 2 and 4putting an additional burden on the payment network server 32.

Whilst the foregoing description has described exemplary embodiments, itwill be understood by those skilled in the art that many variations ofthe embodiment can be made within the scope and spirit of the presentinvention.

The invention claimed is:
 1. A computer system for generating, for acustomer associated with a payment card, a customer preference model,the computer system comprising: an interface for receiving, for thecustomer from a point-of-sale terminal, transaction data relating to aplurality of payment transactions the customer makes using the paymentcard; a database for storing the transaction data; a database ofmerchant data, including profiles of a plurality of merchants, theprofiles of the plurality of merchants including data indicatingproducts offered by the merchants, and at least one additionalcharacteristic of the merchants; a processor; and a non-transitory datastorage device storing program instructions operative to cause theprocessor: upon receiving transaction data indicating a paymenttransaction using one of the payment cards, to store the data in thedatabase, to generate a model of the price sensitivity of the customerand a model of the brand loyalty of the customer, by comparing the pricesensitivity model and the brand loyalty model, to derive a firstcomponent of the customer preference model which is indicative ofwhether the payment transactions of the customer are more influenced byprice or by brand loyalty, and upon receiving data, from a communicationdevice associated with the customer, in respect of the customerspecifying a product: to identify the merchants offering the product, touse the customer preference model and the at least one characteristicfor any of the merchants who offer the product, to form a compatibilityindex between the customer and the merchants who offer the product, toreceive, from the communication device, data indicative of ageographical location, wherein the compatibility index is calculated inrelation to merchants who supply the product in the geographicallocation, and to transmit to the customer, for display on thecommunication device, information relating to one or more of themerchants and one or more merchant offers for whom the compatibilityindex is highest, wherein, if the first component indicates that thepayment transactions of the customer are more influenced by price thanbrand loyalty, the customer is categorized based on the pricesensitivity model into one of a pre-determined number of tiers; and ifthe first component indicates that the payment transactions of thecustomer are more influenced by brand loyalty than price, the customeris categorized based on the brand loyalty model into one of apre-determined number of tiers.
 2. The computer system according toclaim 1, in which the program instructions are operative to cause theprocessor to generate at least one payment size measure which is ameasure of the size of payment transactions made using the payment card,and to form a second component of the customer preference model usingthe at least one payment size measure.
 3. The computer system accordingto claim 2, in which the program instructions are operative to cause theprocessor to categorize the customer based on the payment size measureinto one of a number of tiers.
 4. The computer system according to claim1, which is operative to use the interface to transmit to thepoint-of-sale terminal or a merchant server a request for additionalinformation relating to the transaction.
 5. The computer systemaccording to claim 1, which is arranged to generate a respectivecustomer preference model for each of multiple customers associated withrespective payment cards, the interface being operative to receive, foreach of the customers, respective transaction data relating to aplurality of payment transactions the customer makes using therespective payment card, and the program instructions being operative tocause the processor to generate the respective customer preference modelfor each of the customers using the respective transaction data.
 6. Acomputer-implemented method for generating, for a customer associatedwith a payment card, a customer preference model, the method comprisinga computer server: (a) receiving, via an electronic interface and from apoint-of-sale terminal, respective transaction data relating to aplurality of payment transactions the customer makes using a paymentcard; (b) storing the transaction data in a database; (c) generating amodel of the price sensitivity of the customer and a model of the brandloyalty of the customer; (d) comparing the price sensitivity model andthe brand loyalty model to derive a first component of the customerpreference model which is indicative of whether the payment transactionsof the customer are more influenced by price or by brand loyalty,wherein, if the first component indicates that the payment transactionsof the customer are more influenced by price than brand loyalty, thecustomer is categorized based on the price sensitivity model into one ofa pre-determined number of tiers; and if the first component indicatesthat the payment transactions of the customer are more influenced bybrand loyalty than price, the customer is categorized based on the brandloyalty model into one of a pre-determined number of tiers; (e)receiving, from a communication device associated with the customer,data from the customer specifying a product; (f) obtaining the customerpreference model; (g) accessing a database of merchant data, includingprofiles of a plurality of merchants, the profiles of the plurality ofmerchants including data indicating products offered by the merchants,and at least one additional characteristic of the merchants; (h)identifying any of the merchants offering the product; (i) using thecustomer preference model and the at least one additional characteristicof any of the merchants identified as offering the product, to form acompatibility index between the customer and any of the merchantsidentified as offering the product; (i) receiving, from thecommunication device, data indicative of a geographical location,wherein the compatibility index is calculated in relation to merchantswho supply the product in the geographical location; and (k)transmitting to the customer, for display on the communication device,information relating to one or more of the merchants and one or moremerchant offers for whom the compatibility index is highest.
 7. Thecomputer-implemented method according to claim 6, in which at least oneof the price sensitivity model and the brand loyalty model is calculatedusing addendum data in the transaction data comprising stock keepingunit (SKU) data.
 8. The computer-implemented method according to claim6, in which step (c) further includes: generating at least one paymentsize measure which is a measure of the size of payment transactions madeusing the payment card; and forming a second component of the customerpreference model using the at least one payment size measure.
 9. Thecomputer-implemented method according to claim 6 further comprisingusing the interface to transmit to the point-of-sale terminal or amerchant server a request for additional information relating to thetransaction.
 10. The computer-implemented method according to claim 6,which includes generating a respective customer preference model foreach of multiple customers associated with respective payment cards,using respective transaction data relating to a plurality of paymenttransactions each of the customers makes using the respective paymentcard.
 11. The computer-implemented method according to claim 6, in whichthe information relating to the one or more of the merchants for whomthe compatibility index is highest includes information relating to theprices charged by these merchants for the specified product.